An Offer of Enlistment
by Kallamae
Summary: A 'freelance cargo specialist' looses her ship, her partner and her freedom, and gains an offer of enlistment. A closer look at how Kiryn Maar ends up on the Endar Spire.


Smell was the first sense to return. The faint briny scent of kolto mixed with the stark antiseptic odor of a room kept too clean. A medical unit. And if the high-pitched ringing in her ears was any indication, Kiryn Maar was there with good reason. She just wasn't quite sure what that reason was yet.

Kiryn reigned in her instinct to panic and began taking stock of herself. _I know who I am. Not so clear on the where. Or the when and why for that matter. _She tested out her toes and fingers. Since they all wiggled on cue, she figured her injuries couldn't be too severe. Or at least not anymore. Her eyes didn't want to open, but after just long enough to make her worry she'd be blinded, they did. She blinked at the bright artificial light and rubbed stinky gunk out of her eyelashes. Kolto residue. That confirmed of coupled suspicions, but didn't actually answer any questions. _So, I've been tanked. _She crumbled the residue between her fingers. The pieces fell to the bed leaving bluish specks on the clean white linens.

She still didn't know why she'd had to spend time in a healing tank. Her fingers explored her face. The skin was smooth, healthy. Aside from a bit of weakness, her limbs were fine. She sat up and pulled her knees to her chest. The ringing in her ears had subsided, but her head ache with a dull throb. _Concussion?_

Starting at the base of her skull, Kiryn's fingers worked through her dark brown hair searching for any abnormalities in the hidden flesh. And she found it. Just above the hairline of her left temple she felt the raised line of a scar. _Well, _she concluded, _at least it didn't mess up my face._

_Alright now, think. What happened? _She closed her eyes and sank back into the bed. _What's the last thing you remember?_ Her mind began cataloging missions. Details of successful runs and payments scrolled through her thoughts interrupt by a few misadventures and one thoroughly botched job involving two feuding Hutts, a crate full of contaminated spice, a Twi'lek domo working undercover for a third Hutt and a trio of slave dancers willing to do anything to cover passage to freedom. But the Annian haul had been after that so…

Sighing sharply, Kiryn tried a different tactic. She mentally walked though their freighter, the _Six_. The cargo hold was full. Nondescript crates were stacked in neat rows and the pungent scent of spice crept from the containers along the far wall. She peeked into the small crew quarters. Her bunk was neatly arranged. The worn bedclothes were tucked in with clean lines and a single footlocker was tucked beneath the foot of the bed. On the other side of the room, a second bunk sat in perfect contrast. The sheets were twisted and wrinkled and clothes were heaped haphazardly on the foot of the bed. _Coop_, she thought. _Always messy. Even back in the orphanage. _

Glimpses of their shared childhood replaced the image of their quarters on the _Six._ A redheaded boy and a freckled girl with her dark hair in pigtails ran wild through the simple farmlands of Deralia. No one had been surprised when they ran off to become "freelance cargo specialists." "Coop," she asked with her eyes still closed, "what went wrong?"

Her memory found the answer…

_The gentle chime of an incoming comm pulled Kiryn out of a dreamless sleep. She yawned lazily and stretched as the beeping became more insistent. One hand worked at the controls in front of her while the other rubbed away the last remnants of sleep from her eyes. Text scrolled across the small screen. A standard distress call repeated itself over and over again. Kiryn directed the small freighter's sensors to the coordinates in the message._

"_What going on?" Coop asked around a mouthful of food as he entered the small bridge. He crammed the remainder of his lunch into mouth and slipped into the pilot's chair. _

"_Distress call," she answered. Checking the scan, she added, "Looks like a single ship. Republic patrol."_

_Coop mulled over the information as he finished chewing. "Any specifics?"_

_Kiryn shook her head. "Nothing. And they're either not answering or just not able to answer a comm."_

"_I don't like it," he said. _

_She echoed the feeling. The hold of the _Six_ was filled with contraband. And in addition to their normal harmless shipment of spice were three crates of weapons headed for a non-Republic world. The last people they wanted to run into were a patrol. But…_

_The blackness between worlds and trade lanes was deep and dark and lonely. Trouble out here could easily be a long death. Some spacers might have fallen far enough to not care, but they hadn't reached that low. Republic patrol or not, Kiryn's heart said to help. And one look into Coop's green eyes told her he was having the same thought._

"_A favor given is a favor earned," he recited the words of Mother Tressa, the only caretaker who bothered to instill any sense of morality into the two troublemakers. _

_Kiryn smiled. That adage had gotten them into trouble more than once. Not everyone in the galaxy was so eager to return a good deed, especially not the people they usually dealt with. Still, it was the right things to do. And the chance of having a Republic patrol owe them one was too good to pass up._

_The problem was, it wasn't a Republic ship and it wasn't in distress._

_One moment it appeared to be drifting and the next, it was alive and firing. A volley of electromagnetic pulses ripped through the _Six's_ shields. Coop swore as lights on the control panel flickered._

_Kiryn snapped out a status report as Coop twisted their ship into an evasive roll. "Turret, now!" he ordered. _

"_On it." She shot out of the co-pilot's seat and down the short corridor. _

_The ship lurched violently sending her crashing to the ground. Smoke poured out of the access panels above her head. "Coop!" she called out over the alarms, but didn't receive an answer. "Damn it," she gritted her teeth and began crawling toward the ladder to the top-side turret._

_Before she could reach it, the world exploded into a blinding sphere of bright light. There was a crack like the galaxy being torn in half. For a terribly long moment, the air rushed out of her lungs and ice crept up her fingers chilling her entire body. Then, it all dissolved into numb darkness… _

"Miss Maar?" A gentle voice pulled Kiryn out of the memory. "Commander Alderin," the owner of the voice introduced himself. He looked like a toy soldier brought to life. Unlike the minor officials Kiryn had worked around in the past, he had a calm aura of command without the desperate need to prove it. "May I?" he motion to the chair near her bed before sitting. "I'm sure you must have a multitude of questions."

"Where am I?"

"The Tellic Medical Facility," he answered. "It was closest and your need was critical."

"You brought me here?" she asked.

Cmdr. Alderin nodded. "That trap you stumbled into was, I believe, meant for my ship. A small Sith contingent has been harassing patrols in this area. They aren't enough to confront us directly, so they've turned to cruder methods."

Kiryn bit at her lower lip and asked the question she was afraid she already knew the answer to, "My partner?"

The commander looked away before answering, "I'm sorry. Miss Maar."

Tears welled in her eyes. Coop was gone. She hugged her knees and fought to retain some semblance of composure.

"Truly, I'm sorry," he repeated. "The bridge of your ship was…gone. Had you been another meter closer to it… We were incredibly lucky to have found you in time. Your ship…"

Kiryn let his words float by her. She already knew all she needed to. Coop was dead and the _Six_ destroyed. His condolences, his descriptions, all just meaningless words. She wiped away the tears from her cheeks and took a long, slow breath.

"There is something else," a shift in his tone brought his words back into focus. "You should know that when you were brought here… Well, you must be aware that there are several warrants… Miss Maar, you were placed under arrest."

Kiryn's opinion of the commander plummeted. Outrage broke through her grief. "You can't be serious! You pulled me out of the wreckage of my ship just to arrest me."

"I'm afraid so. My patrols were in this sector to counter the smuggling problem. Especially weapons. We are, Miss Maar, at war."

"Right, and if a Hutt lord has a few crates of weapons to make sure he stays out of your war… Well, that's just the key to winning, isn't it?" her sarcasm was thick.

"Are you really so naïve?" he asked. "Do you actually believe that the Hutts are entirely neutral?" When she had no quick retort, he continued, "Our intelligence operatives believe that the Hutts are selling arms and in some cases prisoners to the Sith."

_We never should have taken that job_, she reprimanded herself. "Look, my ship and cargo were destroyed. You've got nothing to base your charges on."

"As I said before, we're at war. I don't need physical evidence to hold prisoners."

Kiryn considered the man. His posture was impeccable and his face unreadable. Something seemed off, but she couldn't identify anything out of place. _Maybe you're just not used to dealing with anyone so uptight._ _And maybe it still doesn't make sense to rescue someone just to hold them prisoner._ "What's the real point of all this?" she asked.

The commander smiled. "The point is this, you have a choice. You can either rot away in a prison cell until the war ends and stand trial, or accept a very generous offer."

"It was a 'very generous offer' that got me into this mess in the first place," she countered.

"Enlist in the Fleet."

Kiryn was expecting something far more sinister or lecherous than military service. "What?"

"The offer is simple. We need talented people and we need them faster than they can be trained. I know your entire file, Miss Maar. You speak more languages than anyone I've ever met, you've seen combat, and you know the lanes better than any core world recruit ever could. The Republic needs people like you."

_It can't be worse than prison,_ she considered. And there was the small matter of a favor owed. Kiryn would see to it that the Sith paid their debt in full and the Republic Fleet might be the best means of accomplishing that. "I'm listening."

"You'll enlist as a contracted advisor. You'll have no official rank, but will receive lieutenant's pay and benefits. After one year of service, you can renegotiate or leave with a clean record."

"What about Coop?"

"I'm not sure what you mean."

"Coop's record," she clarified. "His record is clean before I sign." It might not matter to anyone else in the galaxy, but she wouldn't leave his name sullied while clearing hers.

"Done," Cmdr. Alderin agreed.

"Alright," Kiryn extended her hand, "we have a deal."

"Excellent, Miss Maar," he shook on the agreement. "You've made the right choice. I'll have your orders drawn up immediately."

"Where am I going?"

"The _Endar Spire_," he answered.


End file.
